Project Sail

by Anthony DeCosmo

  He radioed, “They are vulnerable. Have the little buddies hit them both right now!”

  She was about to respond when an electronic screech blasted over the radio, causing Hawthorne to grimace before his audio compensators could taper the overload.

  As bad as he had it, it hit Kelly worse. He heard her scream and at the same time Moe nearly fell from the sky, Larry bounced around as if contracting a robotic form of rabies, and Curly danced across the battlefield in uncontrolled circles.

  The Goliaths used a feedback weapon aimed at the link between the robots and Kelly’s implants.

  However, her military-grade chip compensated. Hawthorne realized that an Alliance weapon designed to disorientate implant-wearers was less effective than the alien cylinder’s emission.

  She did not recover fast enough, however. A burst of bullets from a centrifuge gun hit Curly, blasting the robot into pieces.

  Even with stimulants pumping through his veins, Hawthorne’s heart sank for Kelly as she lost one of the few things in her life that felt like family.

  Meanwhile, the C-RAM lasers lit the sky again, intercepting another round of mortar shots. Hawthorne saw the damaged Goliath was back in action, with a gray patch in the center of its chassis.

  Commander Hawthorn ran, heard a whirring noise, and dove to the ground just as the last whirlybird came in from the east and tried to behead him. Moe came to the rescue, pelting the enemy flyer with bullets and then raking it with his mechanical talons. The whirlybird lost control and crashed.

  The swarm of nanobots that had repaired the Goliath showed they could harm as well as heal. They attacked a mobile C-RAM platform, stripping it bare like a school of piranha on fresh meat.

  One down, the swarm made for the next C-RAM. Hawthorne worried those nanobots would decide to devour human flesh.

  The electric guitar gong sounded again and another coil gun projectile struck the undamaged Goliath near the top, decapitating the thing.

  Four of the little buddies ran at the headless giant, grappled its hydraulic legs, and self-detonated, toppling the walking pillar. Secondary explosions finished the job.

  Hawthorne reached the southern hill a few yards from Kelly’s hiding spot behind a rock outcropping.

  “Bill, do you read me?”

  No answer.

  Kelly said, “We don’t have time!”

  Punctuating her point, as the cloud of nanobots finished devouring the second self-propelled C-RAM, the patched Goliath targeted the coil gun with its main laser, melting it in four seconds.

  With the battle turning against them, Hawthorne felt he no longer had time to wait, so he played the only real card they held.

  Calling across all frequencies he broadcast, “This message is for the European Alliance Commander. Halt your attack or we will destroy the alien artifact. Signal your response.”

  The only response came from the Goliath as its main laser swept the battlefield taking out all but the last three little buddies, who scurried around on their wheeled feet to avoid the giant’s weapons while taking potshots of their own.

  The last C-RAM unit tried to escape, perhaps driven by a robotic sense of self-preservation, but the nanobots engulfed it. This time, however, things did not go as the mechanical bugs planned.

  Kelly’s robotic dog Larry charged at the swarm and ejected a small black ball that fell amid the nanobots, detonating a targeted electromagnetic pulse. The nanobots dropped to the ground like flies zapped by insecticide.

  Moments later, the last of the little buddies reached the Goliath and self-detonated, damaging the metal beast’s left leg.

  Hawthorne broadcast again: “Alliance command, call off your attack or we will destroy the cylinder, this is your last warning!”

  He realized how true that was. This would be the last warning, one way or another.

  No reply.

  Kelly Thomas shouldered her sniper rifle and fired a projectile. It hit the Goliath just above the scar left by the coil gun. The machine wobbled and then targeted her with its main laser. She ducked below the ridge and the thick red beam missed high, but nearly melted her suit anyway.

  Hawthorne ran and shot, hitting the Goliath with dozens of rounds over the span of five seconds, but his bullets could not breach its thick hide.

  The war machine ignored him and stepped toward the ridge where Kelly hid. Before it could drop a mortar shell on her position, Larry launched a full salvo of missiles into its back, and then ran for cover before the laser could turn the robot to scrap.

  Hawthorne tossed both EMP and AP grenades in a fit of desperation; neither caused notable damage.

  Kelly popped up from behind the ridge and fired three quick shots with the high-powered rifle, barely scratching its armor.

  Damaged and smoking but still standing, the Goliath targeted Kelly with its main laser…but never got the shot off.

  Moe dive-bombed the tall-skinny, smashing into the upper third at hundreds of miles per hour. The resulting explosion sent Hawthorne tumbling and caused a rainstorm of shrapnel.

  And then…silence.

  For thirty-minutes, a horrid racquet had filled the air; rocket engines, explosions, marching mechanical legs, shouts and screams. But now only silence and a field of destruction. Blasted metallic carcasses, shell casings, and bomb craters covered the field’s green grass.

  Commander Hawthorne found Kelly with her back against a rock, Larry at her feet, and her knees pulled to her chin.

  “Are you okay?”

  She said, “I wasn’t controlling him. I was focused on shooting the sniper rifle hoping I could hit a critical system. I let Moe fly autonomously.”

  “Are you hurt?”

  “Moe did that himself. I wouldn’t have wanted him to; he did it himself.”

  Hawthorne knew there was another Goliath out there, as well as many more EA soldiers. Once they settled their camp, they would come, unless he could convince them otherwise.

  But for now, Jonathan sat on the ground, wrapped an arm around her, and listened to her cry.

  44. Captain Charles

  Hawthorne left Kelly with Dr. King in the research camp and searched for Bill Stein, although he could guess what he would find. Still, he doubted the EA would launch another assault until they understood why their two Goliaths had suffered defeat.

  Besides, whenever that assault came, there would be no way to stop it. Rigging the explosives—if he could find them—might still be the only hope of surviving.

  Fatigue from the battle and stimulant withdrawal slowed him down; it took him more than thirty minutes to cover the distance to the grassland outside the cylinder cave. There he found Bill Stein’s body a few yards from Probe 581. Cutting wounds to his upper torso consistent with lasers suggested a whirlybird had killed him.

  The package containing the explosives remained slung on his shoulder and his PDW lay three feet away surrounded by shell casings, suggesting he had gone down with a fight. But Stein was a pilot, not a warrior; he only wanted to fly.

  Hawthorne knelt and put a hand on his friend’s space suit.

  What a waste.

  A long shadow flickered across Hawthorne and his dead friend. He turned and saw a small shuttle land near the probe. With a two-person cockpit and a small passenger module, the ship resembled an earthly helicopter except with rocket pods and thrusters instead of rotors.

  Hawthorne placed his weapon on the ground and calmly faced the newcomers, his body and spirit too exhausted to fight.

  Two men wearing heavy combat armor and headgear resembling welder’s masks came out first and pointed bulky repeater rifles in Hawthorne’s direction. Captain Charles exited next, dressed in a standard pumpkin suit and brandishing a high-powered pistol followed by the pilot who wore a lightweight suit with a side arm holstered on her hip.

  “I guess it’s my turn to point a gun in your face, Commander.”

  “Ah gee, Cap, you’re not still sore about that, are you?”

  Charles mo
tioned toward Stein’s body and said, “He was a good man and a skilled pilot. What a shame you dragged him in to this.”

  “Don’t you dare try that. If you are going to be a traitor, have the courage to be a bastard. Everything that happened is on your shoulders.”

  “Where are Lieutenant Thomas and Dr. King?”

  “They are dead, too.”

  “Bull shit. The last battle report showed Thomas was still fighting and no sign of Dr. King.”

  “Perhaps they went for a stroll on such a lovely day.”

  “I do not think you understand your predicament, but tell me, why was Stein out here by himself with a bomb?”

  “I was hoping to use the threat of blowing up the alien artifact we found as leverage to guarantee safe passage for me and the rest of the crew. I just want to go home.”

  Charles motioned with his pistol for Hawthorne to lead the way and told him, “Show me.”

  The two soldiers and Charles followed Hawthorne into the cave and then toward the shaft where Hawthorne pointed his helmet light up to shine on the crossbeam.

  “Alien construction, Captain. This was the first proof there had been a civilization on this moon.”

  Next, they entered the cylinder chamber that was still well lit by the walking cargo lights and surrounded by mechanical probes.

  The entire group—even Hawthorne—paused in front of the artifact, mesmerized not only by its appearance, but by how it hung in the air with no visible tethers.

  Charles walked up to the floating cylinder, reached out, but did not touch. In that moment, he was not a traitor or a man with a gun; he was an astronaut who had followed a career in space because he dreamed of moments like this one.

  “So what is it?”

  “We don’t know,” Hawthorne replied. “Coffman said it gave off synchrotron radiation similar to a particle accelerator, and it does generate a noise periodically.”

  “I do not hear anything.”

  “Well, it fades in and out, but if we wait I am certain you will hear it.”

  One soldier examined a rover, another stepped back and leaned against the wall seeking relief from the encumbrance of full combat gear.

  As they waited, Hawthorne asked, “How much did the Alliance pay you to be a traitor?”

  Captain Charles waved the gun and said, “Do not make me angry.”

  “Not much of a threat because you will kill me one way or another. Since I received this assignment you have had it in for me. I want to hear what makes a man turn his back on decades of service. What was your price tag, Captain?”

  “An opportunity to explore.”

  Hawthorne pointed out, “The Niobe was yours to command.”

  Charles hesitated and then his face grew stern.

  “I spent my career adding columns of numbers, filing reports, and streamlining supply routes. I went to every seminar, I learned every new piece of technology, and I took extra courses in ship management and theoretical physics. I waited my turn to escape that desk and see this,” he pointed at the cylinder. “I received command of the Niobe, but only during training. I was to be replaced before launch by Admiral Duncan.”

  “Amanda?”

  “Yes, your shipmate from Ganymede, the one who climbed the ranks faster than anyone.”

  “She is a brilliant tactician,” Hawthorne conceded.

  “She is from a military family and from what I gather, she played along with the headlines about your heroism because that is the story the navy wanted published.”

  “So you went over to the Europeans out of spite, and let the Niobe and her crew die. Sorry, Captain, I just cannot find any pity for you.”

  Charles insisted, “I had nothing to do with what the Chinese did. They received bad intelligence and panicked. I was visiting a friend when they hit the shipyard. I trained that crew, they were friends, and the last thing I wanted was for them to die. More than anything, I wanted to come with them here, but I was to be assigned to fleet logistics.”

  Hawthorne listened to Charles rant but he knew what he must prepare for, and he did not like it. A lonely voice in the back of his head suggested negotiation, that maybe the EA would let them leave unharmed. But Jonathan Hawthorne had seen too many of these games before; he knew how it ended, unless he acted when the time came.

  The thought of it caused his stomach to lurch and his hands to shake, but he tried to focus; tried to be ready. The alien cylinder would give him one last chance to survive, any minute now.

  “Duncan backed out,” Charles continued his story. “I think the whole Chinese thing made her family nervous. They figured the other powers would try to stop any mission using the A-H drive. So they ran a program to come up with a replacement crew before they found I was still alive.”

  “And that program picked me; that’s why you have hated me since this started.”

  “A fake hero with no understanding of what this trip means to humanity. Still, when they found I survived they had no choice but to give me the ship and keep you on as my executive officer.”

  Hawthorne caught on and he nearly laughed at Charles’ bad luck.

  “When you found out you were not commanding the Niobe, you started feeding the European Alliance secrets about the A-H drive. Then the Chinese blow it up and the navy assigns you command of SE 185. You were stuck, Captain. You finally got your dream job, but only after you decided to play for the other team. If you didn’t have so much blood on your hands, I would almost feel sorry for you, but you picked your poison.”

  Charles walked around the alien cylinder, staring at it like a visitor inspecting the treasures in an art museum.

  “This is all I ever wanted, to see the universe. You can’t understand that, can you? You want women, drink, and luxury. I wanted to get out from behind a desk and sail. I was patient, I put in my time, the Niobe should have been mine.”

  “That was not a visit to a friend; you were meeting with EA intelligence when the Chinese attacked. Oh what irony, Captain. If the Niobe had been yours, you would have died when the Chinese attacked. Instead, you finally get that big command but by then the Alliance owned you. So then they had their own A-H drive but they also had you. They could afford to pick and choose their first mission, based on the information you sent. I assume we missed something in your cabin, or someone helped you send a message.”

  Charles, however, did not pay attention to Hawthorne’s words, he merely repeated, “It should have been mine.”

  “Okay, fine, what happens now?”

  The Captain answered, “I will oversee exploration here. The USNA does not have a warship with an A-H drive yet, so our cruiser will control this system for the foreseeable future. Eventually I will have my own command, an exploration vessel, and I will travel from star to star.”

  “And an American assassin will kill you someday.”

  “Not today. Let’s go outside and finish this up.”

  “Without hearing the cylinder?”

  “I think you are full of shit but still, I’ll play,” and he raised his forearm and spoke into a communicator. “Major, bring in the portable sensor package from the cargo hold. We need equipment that detects acoustics.”

  They waited another two minutes until the petite pilot walked into the chamber struggling with two heavy cases. She stopped and gawked at the cylinder the way everyone did when first seeing it.

  Eventually a soldier came to her aid and the two worked to set up a monitoring station although she kept looking at the artifact.

  Hawthorne asked, “Any chance you can let me and the crew leave, unharmed?”

  “I don’t want to talk about that.”

  “So that’s how you start your new career as an explorer; killing us. Congratulations, Captain Charles, another murdered crew for you to live with.”

  Charles hesitated, the corners of his mouth turned down and his eyes drooped. Could that be regret? A change of heart?

  “Ultimately it is not my decision,” Charles waffled. “I
do not want to kill anyone.”

  Charles might have changed his mind, might have even argued to his European masters to allow SE 185’s crew to leave, but time ran out and Hawthorne could not afford hope.

  The cylinder came to life, the previously invisible cracks in its surface glowing and that mind-bending alien broadcast emitting from within.

  Whether it was energy, brain waves, or some other radiation, that discharge filled the chamber again, attacking the thoughts of everyone inside.

  Images pried into Hawthorne’s brain, but he knew to push them aside and concentrate; he only had seconds.

  Charles, his implant amplifying the affect, instinctively grasped at the side of his helmet, as if the physical act of trying to block his unreachable temples would somehow ward off the assault. Hawthorne stepped to him and reached for the pistol. The Captain struggled and the weapon discharged into Charles’ suit; his grip eased.

  Implanted with military-grade thinkers, the two soldiers and the pilot were incapacitated, one soldier dropping to his knee, the other staggering about the chamber, the pilot crying out.

  Hawthorne let out a primitive roar released by his survival instinct to fill him with the adrenaline to fight. He fired and the pistol bucked in his hand, nearly breaking his wrist. The first three rounds went into the chamber walls before bullets four and five struck a weak spot in one soldiers’ armor, scrambling his innards.

  The second soldier was so busy grappling with the images painfully thrust into his head that he did not realize Hawthorne was now armed. The Commander ran up behind him and fired at point-blank range, overcoming the armor’s protection.

  The pilot struggled to ward off the alien transmission, screaming and staggering side to side, but as she saw Hawthorne turn toward her she reached for her holster.

  Hawthorne’s terrified scream morphed into a plea: “No!”

  But either she did not understand or did not care because she drew her side arm.

  He shot her three times with the final round smashing her helmet and splaying bloody gore onto the alien cylinder. Her dead fingers twitched and sent bullets into the ground as she fell backwards.